Citings & Sightings of Dante's Works in Contemporary Culture
“Dante’s Inferno: An Animated Epic is a 2010 adult animated dark fantasy film. Based on the Dante’s Inferno video game that is itself loosely based on Dante’s Inferno, Dante must travel through the circles of Hell and battle demons, creatures, monsters, and even Lucifer himself to save his beloved Beatrice. The film was released on February 9, 2010.” —Brandon Auman, “Dante’s Inferno: An Animated Epic,” Wikipedia, (retrieved January 24, 2024)
“Un progetto, che sarà pubblicato in tre dvd nel 2023, a metà tra letteratura, cinema e musica: una composizione per banda musicale mai incisa e le immagini ritrovate circa vent’anni fa di una trilogia di film muti sulla Divina Commedia del 1911.” — “Castelli Romani, il viaggio di Dante per musica e immagini con la banda musicale di Albano”, La Repubblica, March 25, 2023
It has been announced that, in 2023, a unique soundtrack by Albano’s band will be released, accompanying a new version of the Helios-Psiche 1911 film adaptation of the full Divina Commedia (not to be confused with the more famous 1911 Inferno by Milano Films).
“Paterson (dir. Jim Jarmusch, 2016) is an Amazon Prime original film about a bus driver named Paterson (Adam Driver) who writes poetry in his free times and on his breaks from work, though his only audience for them is his wife Laura (Golshifteh Farahani). The movie follows the bus driver/poet on a weeklong journey of everyday experiences, watching him observe the sights, sounds, and people of the town of Paterson, New Jersey. During the first day, the film shows Paterson sitting down to eat his lunch which was packed by his wife, and shows that she had put a Dante Alighieri postcard in it, which he looks at and acknowledges verbally before eating his lunch and writing his own poetry.” –Contributor Robert Alex Lee
Contributed by Robert Alex Lee (Florida State University, MA 2024)
“The dialogue between the work of Dante and film will be the theme of Professor Helge Rønning‘s conference, organized by the Italian Cultural Institute of Oslo and streaming live on the Institute’ s Facebook page.
“This happy conjunction is taking place in the year of the celebrations for the 700th anniversary of the poet’s death and in the week of the 2021 edition of Fare Cinema, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation’s festival dedicated to promoting Italian film and its trades. The possibilities arising from the encounter between Dante – in particular the Divine Comedy and the Inferno – and film (and later television) have long fascinated filmmakers, ever since the days of silent films.” –“Dante in film and television,” Italiana, July 15, 2021 (link expired, but see the Wayback Machine’s archived version here)
Netflix’s teen comedy-drama Metal Lords (a collaboration between D. B. Weiss and Tom Morello) features an epic discussion of Ulysses and the 8th circle. “What’s more metal than that?”
Netflix subscribers can view the movie here. The Ulysses scene runs from 48:09 to 51:24.
Contributed by Sara Diaz (Fairfield University)
Read an interview with writer-producer D. B. Weiss (Game of Thrones showrunner) and executive producer Tom Morello (guitarist from Rage Against the Machine) on their collaboration here.
All submissions will be considered for posting. Bibliographic references and scholarly essays are also welcome for consideration.
Coggeshall, Elizabeth, and Arielle Saiber, eds. Dante Today: Citings and Sightings of Dante’s Works in Contemporary Culture. Website. Access date.
